The “Australian Example” Of Gun Control

It’s also being decried in the comments as either a good thing because guns=bad, or by people who are Australians (or claiming to be or speaking for them) who say it’s bull. Except it’s no fabrication.

The Australians I know who are/were into the shooting sports confirmed it for me years ago. There are lots of restrictions, and there are restrictions based in which region you live (New South Wales vs Queensland vs Northern Australia, etc.). There were mandatory buybacks – which are confiscation with a gift certificate. There are laws like having to leave your firearms at a club rather then be able to take them home (no self defense), a limit on the number and or type of firearm you can own, where you can and can’t use it, and how they have to be inspected and can be revoked as per whims of the police.

A couple years ago I had some interesting conversations with an Australian who’d been a police officer and firearm afficionado (until the ban came and his guns went away) and a New Zealander. The Kiwi delighted in giving the Aussie grief about how his rights had vanished into a revoked privilege.

Another Aussie I know who was a prolific collector finally just quit because the licensing and legal hassles pushed him out of the hobby he enjoyed. And he was someone who through family was in a financial position to not have to worry about it. Of the Aussies I know who were gun folks, only one bothered to keep jumping through the hoops to please a government that actively sought to legislate, regulate, and restrict his natural rights into nearly non-existent and easily revokable privileges.